prologue - Fragmented
by existinction
Summary: A shell of a creature that used to be human struggles to recall his origins. It can only recall bits and pieces, yet even with what it has, it can't be made whole again. Perhaps if it can recall hard enough, it could remember its roots from what it used to be. Even then, can it be sure it's memories belongs to itself all along?
How does one ask their self why? It's bothersome, really. aren't you supposed to be an ally to your own life? Can't say that I am. I'm always fighting against my own luck and assume blame on myself, but I don't know if that makes sense. Isn't it circumstances of your surroundings? or my past choices coming up in ugly ways to chastise me for bringing value to an existence that was a mistake in the first place? so many questions, though so simple in design. How stupid everything is after you've already been through it, or rather, how stupid emotions can make even the most simplistic of situations and events akin to a spider's web. Well, perhaps it's a Pyrrhic that eventually i ended up like this. Not my problem, not the solution, just my present for my obstinate nature, though i could technically say I moved past it, all things considering.

I see nothing but a fog whenever I try to remember anything before my change, though wouldn't say there is anything meaningful to recall in the first place. Well, not really a fog, but more like a 2-way looking glass. All my precious memories, as loose as I can call them without it coming off as sarcastic, playing out before me like a road of film, without the whole "attachment" nonsense bringing any of it value. I can see tidbits of happy times, but only because it's equivalent of seeing foreign objects through roaring rapids. The sea of black that belies pain, suffering, greed, betrayal, torture, decadence, and everything else in between that makes up those concepts pour over my thoughts as if someone broke the dam of sanity. Though as creatures of habit, humans, probably me, still sorting that out, can adapt to literally everything thrown at them. Sadly, this doesn't translate to physical means, but that would mean we'd eventually live forever, and that can possibly mean the end of the world since having a shelf life is the only incentive people cluck about humanity like the feel-good soft drink that most people claim it to be.

Though just like a soft drink, the sugary context can sit in your stomach, congeal to fat, and can potentially turn into the baggage that can lend justification to the opportunity of projecting it onto everyone else, or as the trendy people call it, "evil". I mean, some do realize they need a diet plan to cleanse their future palette of debauchery, but some like to claim its a fashion statement and assume it's their identity, which propels them right beyond the line of redemption. I did my fair share of community service ensuring the side doesn't get overpopulated, though i gave them all a fair chance to push me out as now, all I can do is stare at the barren wasteland, the eerily clear sky, the ruins of a mountain, and an explanation that sounds like math smashed into humanity like a meteorite made of magic. It's not even much, I thought anybody could do it, though to be fair, I doubt i can ask anyone advice about how to achieve it anyway.

The Sun is bright and that fact is highlighted by those that love on islands, but I swear the heat can make you think it just grew feelings and remember the smoke of the last fire you built that stank up its atmosphere. It's not bad being in a tropical element once you know how other areas seem to treat other people like another obstacle on their way to work. Everyone knew each other on an island, since the ocean served as a cerulean safety net for even the most ambitious travelers. Apparently there are others that are connected to a bigger network known as archipelagos, but since I was impartial to large bodies of water that long existed before our species, I maintain a hefty skepticism being near it. storms and hurricanes don't help the equation either, but i see the reason why fears evolve to phobias in this regard. wait, I was supposed to try and remember back when i was a child, but I am just failing right now. I can probably recall a cliff notes version to the best of my ability. I was on an island with friends and...family? I want to say, but can't place anything of the sort on it. Goodness me, this is a disaster in itself. Ah, yes! the slaughter of my home as a child, hard to forget that.

I remember those queer soldiers with matching armbands in the shape of a multi-color shield formed by 4 squares and a triangle; squares were black and the triangle was gray. Probably had some symbolism, though didn't care. One tends to pay more attention to the weapons that is ethnically culling your culture and people than the person that wields it. The only good look I saw was the 3 that blitzed my rural abode with my father still inside (so I DO have family! again, bittersweet i suppose). I hid in the nearby greenery as I saw them speaking among themselves, one of them holstering his rifle and pulling out a tablet. he did a few swipes and then did a double take and uttered something to his other two partners. their army fatigues radiated a pale green camouflage pattern that had faded brown stripes all over. It seemed so silly at the time, but more confusing is how i noticed that through the apparent tragedy of my only family being executed. It could be that i didn't know how to react to it, or that my instincts subtly told my emotions to be courteous and not show themselves in front of the strange men with guns. The soldier with a tablet did a gesture and the other two split up around the home. I admit to not being the sharpest tool in the shed but I felt that they were looking for me, which raised another question that pertained to wondering how the hell did they know he has a son. retreating to the center of the island (everyone wanted to call it shatar village but I don't see the point since we populated the entire island anyway) felt like the best course of action to do since i can probably get an idea on how bad this problem was. It's a big island, but really devoid of any major wildlife threats, at least, as I remember.

Sort of have mixed feelings about my dead dad. He projected enough misery to make a graveyard blush with how he decided living as a hermit from my mom dying giving birth to me. He committed every form of basic level violence, but nothing permanent of note. He had a slim build with caramel skin, sideburns and a goatee, bald head and jet black eyes that I swear felt like you was staring down an empty hallway that had you wonder if there was an end to it. What I'm trying to say is, he wasn't all there, so I wanted to not be there, which resulted in him being more like a doodle in my head. Though I still believed he didn't deserve a premature end like that, I approve karma and its penchant for balance, but I hope it didn't get careless with the blast radius and went to other parts of the island. Adrenaline, the rustling of the leaves and bushes, and the frantic stomping of my sprint to the center was all I remember, all the way up until I saw perhaps the most utterly revolting sight that no child should ever be able to see.

The soldiers were in a single file line passing around what used to be my neighbors. I'm hesitating to even calling them that since I'm sure a prerequisite of one is fighting, and being that our ideals was pacifist by nature, they were just animals indulging in their madness. They all had gas masks so I wasn't able to see their faces with that same faded, obscure camouflage design that the other three I saw had, with maybe 10 of them spread out in a semicircle facing the forestation. They threw the corpses into a giant pile in the middle of the village, while one of the patrolmen broke off to walk around it, either checking for any structural weakness or just admiring their morbid work of art. I was useless in every way just processing the grotesque visage of slaughter before me. Even worse was that I was pretty secluded, and only had me, myself and I to entertain myself, coupled with the fact that my father abstained any relationships with the others. Maybe with time that could have sorted itself out through time, acceptance, friendship and love. Fate had different plans I suppose, though i wish out of all of her concepts of misfortune, it wouldn't involve a small militia. I had far too many questions considering I was made aware of this in all of 10 minutes. I usually have a quip to say being that I feel that I actively attract situations like these, but having a line for a freshly committed genocide is reserved for whatever higher power people believe in. Shaking off the shock, I peered around the revolting sight to see if there was a means of escape, in which i was failing, much to my dismay. Well, more like finding another option besides my first choice.

Well, there was no other option than hiding in the correct pile of corpses. I say "correct" since while most of them was makeshift, one was some plastic cylinder that they fumbled the bodies into which means the important ones they were actually here for were in there . It was easy since they thought they got everyone, and those stupid gas masks were blocking their peripheral, though I had mixed feelings about the touch of fresh blood, dead flesh, and stoic expressions during the trip back. it was a good thing It wasn't the whole way, since I got caught when one of them just "wanted" to check the bag. I have a faint idea that they knew I was in there and just wanted to wait further along on the trip. lovely. I'd say they wanted some color in their circle to bring in diversity, but perhaps they wanted a canvas to project pain onto, and darks mixes better with colors.

They was far from any sort of human beings that you can imagine. I learned that my whole community on that island was basically descendants of criminals sent into exile for murder, though in their state of mind i probably didn't so much learn as just forcibly been barked at. throwing punches, obscenities, and other grown activities I had no business learning, I recall they blindfolded me until I reached some dark looking warehouse where there were other kids maybe between 6-12. This is so fragmented, even I'm getting distracted trying to recall everything. It's like my life so far was "it's a small world" moving through a tunnel of humanity's worst evils. I lived as a slave for most of my life in the black market somewhere where they talked funny (it was called Japanese, i think) until my good old owner decided to cut out my left eye and slice my right ear off, which earned the only sympathy of a guard who died helping me escape. It was strange that I understood every word those slavers barked at me, since they all sound the same but I still "understood". I suppose my first sign was that language barriers were nonexistent, despite my illiteracy, and I didn't study anything since I was too busy learning how much life can suck with the wrong encounters. Yet there I was, absorbing everything like a good little sponge I shouldn't be recollecting all of this upon retrospect, but something demands I summon the context of all that I am. A compelling force of a variety that I have yet to comprehend. I lived on an island, everyone died, got sold as a slave from escaping, wandered from location to location, lived off scraps of garbage, though it ended in a small village called morikawa.

The only clear event that I recall is when I got to this point of simply being, despite any other creature's opinions of the matter, like some small yakuza outfit out east that killed the last person I ever connected humanly with. Name was taka; a snarky, red haired teen that somehow got along with shambling corpse like me, though maybe because his housing situation was like mine, and two birds of the feather aren't picky about company. Turns out he pickpockets, and was very good at it, since no one suspected a frail frame with bulgy eyes and a shit-eating grin to be capable of anything. He was making quite a bit around the city, but i suppose his ignorance got the best of him when he unknowingly robbed some famous enforcer from the most volatile group living around his zip code. It's a shame since even places, and what seems to be any nouns, just ends up being blank to me, as if all miscellaneous information blends into white noise. Upon retrospect, as stupid as I thought it was, he was just trying to live, and nothing else, though I imagine a life of pickpocketing can be harmless unless a pocket belongs to a pretty powerful person. desperation toward survival can be warped into any sort of rational conclusion if you hit the bottom hard enough, though like all byproducts of impulsive actions, it isn't sustainable. He was pursued by their enforcer who was a teenager but with some otherworldly ability, from him being dropped 4 floors of a abandoned factory where taka used as a safehouse. I'm used to explosions, guns, or just simple decay, but the concrete was split inward like it was a door opening to the next one. The bottom floor housed taka in beneath a twisted igloo of rusted girders, pipes and screws, his bottom half severed.

I have zero medical knowledge, so I initially found the fact he was still conscious like that nothing short of the world's most morbid miracle. I ran up to his remains and held him close, slowly registering the recent results of my presence hindering another cared one. love is too strong, since they always die before I could possibly understand it personally, but it has always been like that. The girl that helped me escape when I was captured was tortured to death. the guard that showed me enough empathy to buy time enough for me to escape. Hell, even a family that tried to shelter me got raided by assailants, and thought that their loot was more valuable than them. it all meshes into a black void that just emphasizes all my pain and suffering, and forms a infallible barrier in between my consciousness and my vessel of a body. If there was a description of being dead, yet still existing, I would be it. Though the one thing that prevented my ideal of misanthropy from going through the event horizon was taka's final words, which echo through my left ear every time I find myself falling:

" _You was worth suffering for."_

I dared to be happy and it always costed me someone, not just something, like I was the envoy of death and an omen for the willing who was brave enough to be involved with me. I never had value, nor was any of it even attempted to be instilled in me, but it never occurred for me to end it. If anything, I figured my only value was simply being alive, since my existence was only used to be an extra step, brick, hand, or whatever throwaway people considered those beneath them. If you're dead, then you're a footnote. Even those who died for me or because of me are only remembered from me straining myself to do so. Though, at the same time, death is only pain for others. Only I felt the impact of their release, and could summon the pain that they've given me. Though the freedom to choose who to do it for, and to think they chose me, despite my warnings, cautiousness, and demeanor. No, to kill myself is to take their pain away, the legacy of their decisions, a fundamental element of life itself exists as I breathe. An oddly ironic epiphany that beyond death lies understanding yourself, and the context of the purpose of your existence. The dead enforcer only cinched my ideal. He talked, clearly, his mouth moving and all, but I heard nothing, just muffled noises. Though I did want to hear him, I could not for the life of me. My body just moved on its own and before I could blink, throwing a punch yet disturbingly observing a gigantic shock wave behind him, making a giant hole where the wall behind him used to be and turning him into a crimson visage of mist. It was a astral-like experience that i can't explain, as if I moved in screenshots, disconnected from my actions. It's like I reacted to his malice than, well, him killing my only friend at the time.

I was told that I was made to "conquer" suffering. It's a long shot, but I can't think of another way of it being clarified. Perforated, immolated, mutilated, tortured, and violated, yet I can't believe I didn't die yet when I ponder about it. I wish for death, but to take it myself undermined all the lives that gave their all just to be near me. I only seek its embrace by others, who seeks to spread it and test their volition towards their use of a necessary evil. It will be fate if I am ended by them or not, since my luck has me flung into events of chaos and situations of violence. I seek failure of survival, which seems to only bring about successful destruction of any challenger. The world contradicts my existence through my continued suffering, and yet I remain the eye of the storm of the hurricane that is chaos. Now, I'm just the remains of a human detached from what he was, succumbing to the connection that everyone fought against, yet becoming what no one would ever wish to become should they experience it. a husk of humanity that still breathes, a reality onto itself.

A paradox.


End file.
